In the Spotlight: July 10-14, 2023

In the Spotlight: July 10-14, 2023 

Kudos to these faculty, staff, students and programs 

Do you have a spotlight item to share with the NAU community? 

E-mail your announcements to Inside@nau.edu or use our online submission form. 

• Alum Abdihamid Nur, a former Northern Arizona University NCAA Indoor champion, won the 2023 men’s 5000-meter race at the USATF Outdoor Championship. Recently featured in World Track, the article discusses the unfolding of Sunday’s outdoor championship, where Nur commended NAU coach Mike Smith for extraordinary training skills. 
• Christopher Edwards, an associate professor in the Department of Astronomy and Planetary Sciences (DAPS), was co-author on a presentation at the Ancient Future Brines conference, Investigating the Age, Abundance and Origin of Chloride Salt-Bearing Deposits on Mars. This study goes into chloride salt deposits in Mars and the importance of said investigation for valuable insight gathering into Mar’s aqueous history.   
• Aurélien Stcherbinine, DAPS postdoctoral scholar, Edwards and Nathan M. Smith, DAPS data scientist, are coauthors of a new geophysical research letter, “Diurnal and Seasonal Mapping of Martian Ices With EMIRS.” This article details their monitoring of seasonal evolution of the ices on Mars’ surface. 
• Daniel Kramer, recent MS informatics graduate, Mike Gowanlock, associate professor in the School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems, and David Trilling, chair and professor in DAPS, are coauthors of  “Removing aliases in time-series photometry.” Their article cover their efforts in removing aliases from astronomical surveys to improve the accuracy of period-finding algorithms. 
• DAPS Ph.D. student James Windsor, Ty Robinson, former assistant professor, Ph.D. student Amber Young and Trilling are coauthors of the recently published article, “A Radiative-convective Model for Terrestrial Planets with Self-consistent Patchy Clouds.” The paper share their investigation on exoplanet observation improvement by creating planetary climate models that aid the handling of different atmospheric environments obscuring spectral features in said exoplanet observations. 
• NAU’s Occupational Therapy program was featured in INSIGHT Into Diversity after receiving a $175,000 grant to help provide Arizona foster youth with skills, training and support. The grant from the Vitalyst Health Foundation will allow NAU students to work with more than 100 youth transitioning out of foster care to receive OT services, with the goal of helping these individuals have greater success in college, careers and adult life.
• Emergency manager Robert Church was awarded the Gold Card and Letter from Arizona Qualification System (AQS). The AQS is a statewide deployment system that ensures readiness to respond with qualified personnel. Church is the first Gold Card recipient who has the AQS Emergency Operation Center All-Hazards Position Task Book for EOC Director and Manager. 
• Fred DeMicco, executive director and professor in the School of Hotel and Restaurant Management (HRM), and Jacklyn Louie, an undergraduate student in HRM, analyzed the “Rise of Luxury Hotel Yachts “in their latest published research article. Their research emphasizes the Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection that joined the Marriott Bonvoy and Marriott International’s travel program. 
• Heidi Toth, assistant director of NAU Communications, was elected to the CASE District VII cabinet, which represents colleges and universities from California, Arizona, Utah, Nevada and Hawaii. CASE offers training, resources, conferences and networking for advancement professionals.